Today, we are learning about the time: how to tell, read and write time, and the importance of time in our lives, and how we should cherish and not waste it. Since there are only a finite amount of hours in a day, we shall spend time wisely, and if we waste time on something not very important, we might end up not having enough time to do what really matters to us. So, today we are learning how to choose wisely on what to spend our time and on what not to.
About Time book (buy here) tells an intriguing story about inventing the art of telling time. At first, no one knew the difference between a minute, an hour, and a day. Then people started creating tools to measure time. First, they used the sun, the moon, and the water, but soon they started building clocks. This book is a good introduction to a broader subject of time, including history of time making, and exploring various timepieces through the ages from an Egyptian shadow clock in 1500 B.C. to electric clocks in A.D. 2000.
Moving from general to specific, we shall learn how to tell (read) time. At this technocratic age, electronic digital clocks are pervasive, but I trust they teach children little about the real time. Yes, Adrian at 35 months can recite: it is 4-43, but does he really understand what it means? I think more proper clocks for children are Clocks with Arabic numbers and real bell alarms, which will go off when the time allocated for an activity had elapsed, having children experience the passage of time.
I purchased the 3-part Clocks cards to practice time-telling. (Free download for your personal use here.)
Adrian matching the hour as shown on the picture-clock to the numeral (the red series).
Exploring the bell alarms (buy a clock here).
The cards come in three color-coded groups: hourly, half-past, quarter-past, quarter-to.
Julia matched all the cards, arranging them in matching columns, where first had all 5 o'clocks'; second all 6 o'clocks etc.
Lastly, Julia counted 60 marbles to represent 60 minutes.
Julia and Adrian love their clocks, and they take them everywhere around the house. Even if at a minimum, they learned to be aware of the passage of time, it is a good first step in our Time Learning Study.
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